Category: Marriage

Shocked by the anxiety and depression that accompany in your marriage? Depression and its little voice of negativity can put a strangle hold on your entire existence. These tips from this article will help you stay relaxed and find a balance in your life.

(C) Today Show

Before I start this article I would like to let my readers know that depression and stress related to marriage can affect both men and women and there is nothing to feel low about yourself because getting a dissatisfactory feeling despite of spending some quality time with your in-laws and life partner is absolutely normal and no kind of criminal offense. Post marriage depression is a state of mind that becomes clogged due to many unresolved reasons giving rise to depression causing temporary or permanent troubled marital status.

What is Post Marriage Depression?

Depression is the silent killer of marital relationships. It is a very deadly factor that can be seen in both men and women but are most likely to affect women more as compared to men. Post marriage depression is a condition that can be seen in mostly women within few months of marriage and in many cases it affects the relationship after 1-2 years of marriage. The common symptoms are feeling dissatisfaction, depression, unhappiness, stress, anxiety, disorientation and enraged. Post marriage depression can be the root cause of several severe marital issues, domestic violence and divorce cases.

There are several reasons why post marriage depression is very common in women and mostly Indian women. PMD in women is common as compared to men because when a woman especially Indian, gets married she is bound to live with her in-laws however men live with their own families and are not obligated to leave their family. Hence women undergo several new and uncomfortable rules and laws that change their world upside down making it really tough to adjust for them in a new and unfamiliar environment. Newly wedded women are asked to perform several marriage related rituals in which they are strictly judged by their in-laws and their relatives. They get attacked by several comments and uncomforting criticisms that creates strong imprint in their mind impacting their state of mind.

When a baby comes into the life of married couples, it brings joy around the house. Most especially if it is their first baby. But even if this is the situation, we can never hide the fact that there will always be a problem no matter how happy a family.

1. The change is unavoidable — and often unspeakable.

“If someone tells you that their marriage didn’t change, they’re not being honest with you. When you go from just you and your spouse to you, your spouse and a baby, things will change. Change isn’t a bad thing — at least not always.” — jiffymama616

Sound familiar? Remember when you thought your baby was going to fit neatly into your current life? Nope, not happening. Once you have a baby, you become painfully aware that your life now revolves around this little helpless being who needs you — and who despite having a pretty simple existence (eating, sleeping, pooping), needs round-the-clock care and undivided attention. Consider your world officially rocked — your relationship included.

2. You might hate your partner a little bit.

“I was so hormonal and crazy from breastfeeding, and my husband had a hard time because he didn’t know how to help.” — busymama113

Maybe hate is a strong word, but you might find yourself snapping at your partner a whole lot more than you used to. You might resent him a little for going to work while you’re home on leave, you might despise the way he fastens a diaper or mixes a bottle or washes the whites. But remember: This does not mean you’re headed for divorce. Some people call those early mood swings — likely a result of hormonal changes and sleep deprivation — the ” baby blues” And they’re normal, as long as they don’t escalate into postpartum depression. Your hormones will eventually balance out — but you’ve also got to make up your mind to snap out of your bad mood. For advice on dealing with the baby blues — and with hating your husband because of them — go here.

3. You don’t nurture your relationship the way you know you should.

“We didn’t really talk about how things were going to change once we had a baby. Sure, we talked about diapers and day care and discipline and stuff like that. My husband travels for a living, so when he would come home, he would want 100 percent of my attention, but he had to wait or try to talk over a crying baby and, now, chatty toddler. That was hard for both of us. Mostly our challenges came from not having the time and attention for each other like we did before.” — lilmama514

A great start for some romantic marriage proposal ideas. Read on to get some good ideas and make your proposal special, romantic and a day to remember for the rest of your lives.

The story of how you proposed will be told to friends and strangers for the rest of your lives (no pressure!). Our advice: Put your own spin on one of these romantic, and foolproof, proposal ideas.

1. Choose a favorite place—whether it’s a fountain, hotel rooftop, monument or national park—that has personal significance to the two of you. Once you’re there, ask someone nearby to take a picture of you together, and instead of posing, drop down on one knee.

2. Have a choir, brass band or drum line show up for a surprise performance of your fiance-to-be’s favorite love song in a park or public location for your proposal. For a really personal touch, ask the performers if they can incorporate your fiance’s name into the lyrics.

3. Get in touch with the stage manager of your favorite production and propose after the cast’s curtain call. Call ahead and see if you can have a special note or ad placement added into the playbill, so you have a keepsake of the proposal.

4. Arrange a surprise proposal with a street caricaturist. Have the caricaturist sketch a picture of you two with word bubbles that say, “Will you marry me?” and “Yes!”

5. Ask the divers at an aquarium to put on a proposal show inside their biggest fish tank. Give them a (waterproof) sign that says, “Will you marry me?” to hold up against the glass and then position yourselves for what will, at first, seem like feeding time.

6. Send your unsuspecting fiance-to-be on a treasure hunt that ends with your proposal. Start with a clue at home (a handwritten note or text message) that leads to a tour of your favorite spots all over town.

7. Go out for a night of dancing and ask the DJ or bandleader to pass you the mic so you can dedicate a song and propose on the dance floor.

Do you have trust issues in your marriage? Without trust in your marriage, it cannot succeed. If you have a no trust marriage, you need to rebuild that foundation of trust to have a happy and healthy relationship.

Trust in marriage is extremely vital for your marriage to thrive. Trust is also the most important thing that makes pursuing any relationship worthwhile.

Without trust, a healthy marriage or relationship can not exist.

Can your marriage survive without trust?

Is it even possible to have a great marriage without the complete trust of your wife or husband?

Trusting your spouse is key to a happy, lasting, and healthy marriage!

Without complete trust, it’s impossible for married couples to have a “real” marriage or relationship. By “real” relationship, we mean a healthy one.

Most trust issues in marriages are caused by extra-marital sex, lying, cheating, emotional affairs, constant contact with an ex etc.

The lack of trust and presence of trust issues in marriage certainly plays a big role in many unhappy and unhealthy marriages.

Some of the consequences of trust issues such as infidelity can result in lifelong effects on your kids, spouse, and family.

Building complete trust in your marriage should be a top priority!

Why is trust in marriage so important?

No trust in marriage means your marriage could end in a divorce very quickly. It could also result in separation, and breeds insecurity.

Being able to trust your husband or wife completely provides you with comfort. The freedom to express yourself makes you feel secure, and create’s a peaceful home environment.

It also reduces stress and worries about your husband or wife cheating on you, or doing things behind your back.

In marriage, we have the opportunity to have the most intimate relationship with another human being; our spouse.

And in order to be so closely connected, we must bare our souls to each other.

Dr. Henry Cloud puts it this way, “Intimacy comes from “knowing” the other person at a deep level. If there are barriers to honesty, knowing is ruled out and the false takes over.” (Boundaries in Marriage).

In order for us to feel safe enough to bare our souls to each other, to be naked not just in a physical, but an emotional way with our spouse, we must be able to trust them.

Anniversaries are very important milestones that need to be celebrated. As such, it is very important that you take note of all important anniversaries. This will ensure that you show just how much you care about the other person that you are sharing your life with.

Not sure how to celebrate a first wedding anniversary? Every couple is different and wants to celebrate their own way. The most important thing is to make sure plans align with what they enjoy the most. 1st anniversary ideas include taking a vacation, planning a party or just having a romantic night out.

Here are 10 first wedding anniversary ideas to help you plan the perfect celebration:

Plan a Party: For a social couple that loves to entertain, honor the milestone event by throwing a 1st anniversary party. Invite friends and family to the couple’s home for a night of dinner and drinks. This is a great way to relive the marriage night. Make it personal by including touches from the wedding like a mini version of the wedding cake or the same flower arrangements.

Romantic Night Out: A great way to spend quality time together is to plan a romantic night out. Make reservations at a favorite restaurant and then go out for dessert or dancing.

Romantic Night In: A romantic night in is just as satisfying as a night out on the town when loved ones are together. Nothing beats a home cooked meal with a glass of champagne over candlelight.

How do work schedules affect the home and where do we draw the line between work and family life? Here are some tips in managing your schedules.

If only we could figure out a way to keep life and crazy work schedules from impacting our fabulous marriages, we’d be golden!

Unfortunately, the reality is if we don’t figure out how to manage our work schedules, they will quickly manage us.

This guest post by the always wonderful Paula Rollo can help whether you’re a stay-at-home mom, businesswoman or a combination of them both.

When workloads begin to encroach on your marriage and time with one another, feel free to push back and say, “Not in this house,”

Until tomorrow…make it a great day!

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It can be tough to connect when one or both of you are working extra long hours.

My husband has had a crazy work schedule for most of our marriage, and so we’ve learned some important lessons along the way about how to thrive in a marriage when your time together is minimal.

At some points during our marriage we had conflicting work schedules, and other times my husband was working 55+ hours a week while I stayed home with the kids and even started working from home.

Our schedules are still subject to change, because of the industry my husband works in, but we’ve got a much better handle on how to keep our relationship thriving, even when our time together is not as much as we would like for it to be.

5 Ways to Keep Your Marriage Strong Through Crazy Work Schedules

1. Maximize the Time You Have Together – Don’t spend your time together lamenting that you don’t have more time! Instead, find fun things that create conversation and a relaxing atmosphere for you and your spouse! We try to have a game night at least once a week. This allows us to have fun and spend time chatting while doing something relaxing and entertaining for both of us. (I wrote about our favorite 2 player board games here if you want to check it out!)

2. Remember, It’s Only a Season – Even if it is a very long season, it is still just a season! Like I mentioned above, my husband has worked very long hours and had an unpredictable work schedule for most of our marriage. It is so easy to get frustrated with the scheduling during this season of life, but when I find myself getting upset I like to stop and remind myself this is just a season.

Four years with a difficult schedule is a long time for us, because we’ve only been …

Marriage counseling is an attempt to help a couple resolve any number of types of problems they may be having in their marriage, and to empower them to go forward and have a more successful relationship. No matter what combination of problems, couples seek counseling to get a better understanding of what has gone wrong in their marriage.

This is a common question. All relationships have ups and downs, and it’s hard to know the difference between a passing rough patch or a more serious situation that isn’t going to change on it’s own. Even if your relationship feels pretty difficult, it can easy to talk yourself out of marriage counseling (“Things will get better” or “We’re just under a lot of stress right now” or “This week has been better”).

(c) themarriageandfamilyclinic.com

1. Get Marriage Counseling If…. There Are Longstanding Patterns

It’s only in looking back over months, or even years, that you’re able to see that the old patterns are still there, and that nothing you are trying is leading to meaningful change– it’s better for a bit and then you have the same old fight again. When you are aware that there are long-standing patterns that haven’t changed, despite your efforts, it’s a clue that you might need marriage counseling.

2. Get Marriage Counseling If…. There Is Repeated Empathic Failure

Some of the most damaging long-term patterns in a relationship include patterns of “empathic failure.” This means that one partner comes to the other for emotional support. to share something that is important to them, for help with a problem, or tries to initiate a shared activity (especially sex!) and winds up feeling rejected, ignored, misunderstood, unimportant, or uncared for. A marriage can recover from just about anything…. except repeated empathic failures.

If this is happening in your marriage, get thee to a good marriage counselor. Stat.

3. Get Marriage Counseling If…. There Is A Crisis

Another situation where it’s absolutely essential for couples to get connected with a good marriage counselor is in a crisis. A “relationship crisis” is a situation that is traumatizing to one or both partners. Discovering that one partner has been participating in sexual, emotional or financial infidelity are crises that are very difficult for couples to work through with out the support of a good marriage counselor.

There are two types of major marriage crises that people really need marriage counseling to recover from:

Toxic Marriage Crisis: Feelings have been hurt to the point (on both sides) when productive communication feels impossible. One or both partners is negatively reacting to the other consistently, and any efforts to talk or interact becomes a negative experience (or flat out argument).

Frozen Marriage Crisis: People stop talking altogether. When marriages have been in toxic crisis for a while — arguments, empathic failures, breaks in trust — and couples don’t get …

Remember that in-laws may have different ways of parenting, cleaning, budgeting, etc. Conflicts in these and other areas may and often do arise, so you need to be careful and guard your emotions.

People end up living with their in-laws for a variety of reasons. Either one of you is having financial difficulties and living together helps you save money or someone is sick and requires special care or your culture requires that you live together. Whatever the reason in-laws live together, it is never an easy life. You’ll probably get on each other’s nerves. There will be times when either or both of you wants more privacy or independence. And resentment will likely build.

But there are some benefits to living together. You can save money and help each other. When you’re working late, perhaps your mother-in-law will cook dinner. Maybe your father-in-law will fix the dishwasher or pick up the kids from school. Things certainly are easier if the in-laws are able-bodied and can pitch in. The biggest positive is that you all get to know each other well and can really become a family.

Still, living with the in-laws will only work if you put in effort and prepare properly.

Here are some ways you can make living with the in-laws easier for everyone:

Set boundaries.

Before moving in together, talk to your spouse about what life is going to be like living with the in-laws. Come up with some ground rules for everyone. For example, we’ll take turns taking out the garbage and making meals to avoid having one person feel like all the household responsibilitiesland on his or her shoulders. Another rule might be that you and your spouse must have at leastone night a week to yourselves. The important thing is to create some guidelines that will help you get along and feel comfortable regardless of who is living with you.

Find privacy.

One thing married couples, especially newlyweds need, is privacy. It’s the only way to haveintimacy and to get to know each other better and to build your own family. Although it will be more difficult to have privacy when living with the in-laws, there are things you can do. Even if you have a small home or apartment, you should designate certain areas that are either off limits to you or to your in-laws. You and your spouse should have your own room if possible. All the better if you and your in-laws can have your own apartments with little kitchens within the same complex or building. Then, you don’t have to see each other all the time, and it is like having your independence but still relying on one another or fulfilling obligations.

Stay out of family arguments.

Now that your spouse is living with his or her original family, he or she might revert to being a kid again. He or she might feel a bit trapped or resentful about the situation and it could lead to arguments with his or her parents. If your husband or wife starts fighting with the primary family, stay out of it. Go into another room and try to breathe. Let them ride it out …

“All marriages require work, but when one or both partners start to feel emotionally disengaged the marriage becomes highly vulnerable to further deterioration without outside help. Marriage Counseling can be helpful in a variety of situations, large and small. Married life isn’t always easy. After the rush and excitement from the wedding and honeymoon fade away, reality sets in. Marriage counseling is nothing to be ashamed of or to fear. Anything that can get you and your spouse back on track is a good thing. Whether you have large or small issues, marriage counseling can help you work through them together.”

Do you notice everyone around you is in couples counseling? I do, because I’m a couples therapist. But even among people I meet casually, it seems everyone is going. The stigma of seeing a couples therapist will probably reverse soon.

So, why be left out of this trend? All around you, couples are improving their marriages, and you’re stuck in an uncommunicative, non-intimate, frustrating relationship that makes you feel bad five days out of seven.

“But,” you say, “I have only threatened divorce a handful of times, only under stress, or when we are fighting, which is only often and not constantly, and half of the threats are in my own head. We still have sex at least a couple times a month, and I like my partner at least half the time. Well, a third. What percentage is a fifth again?”

“Surely others,” you continue, “who are truly bad off, are the ones who need couples counseling. My spouse just needs to figure out how not to be such a jerk, and then we will be fine.”

To this series of defenses mixed with white lies and outright denial, I rejoinder, snappily: “If your leg was infected, would you wait for gangrene to set in before seeking medical attention? Do you think marriages improve as you get farther and farther away from the honeymoon period and have more stressors, some which crawl and destroy your home, to contend with?”

“In life, things happen for a reason and divorce is one of those life events that just doesn’t happen by accident. Many couples find themselves wondering should we break up as a result of ongoing relationship problems. Marriage counseling can certainly help to provide answers. In today’s day and age, more marriages end in divorce, I’ve compiled a list of the top ten “symptoms” or reasons why divorce happens.”

Photo by http://www.yourtango.com/

And guess what? Cheating is NOT on the list.

If you think that sexual infidelity is the leading cause of divorce, you’ve got it all wrong. We polled over 100 YourTango Experts to see what they say are the top reasons married couples decide to split, and, believe it or not, communication problems came out on top as the number one reason marriages fail.

Here are some other culprits our experts blame for the alarmingly high divorce rate:

1. You jumped into marriage for all the wrong reasons

Marrying for money — we’ve all heard that that is a ticket to a quick divorce — but what about when you marry because it’s what you think you should do?

I’ve met many divorced women who say the problems that made them leave were there right from the beginning but “everyone expected us to live happily ever after” or “we had already spent so much money on the wedding” or “we had just built our dream home.” So, remember, until you say “I do,” you always have the choice to say “I don’t!”